The new fare system on the buses in my region

[Skelly]

I absolutely hate the new fare system that's been implemented in my region (Västra Götaland, Sweden). Why? Because they decided to make it cash-less. Now you have to either fill up your bus pass in certain stores (where you CAN pay with cash, or you'll have to fill it up by credit/debit card on the bloody bus. Each refill, which used to take no time at all, now takes forever. Yesterday I had to stand outside the bus waiting for some asswipe to get his act together and manage to pay. I think he had to swipe his card three times before everything worked. Meanwhile, I was freezing my balls off on the outside .

If it ain't broke, don't fix it!

[muses_nightmare]

That's fricking stupid! And here I thought the transit system in Vancouver was stupid.

[Dreamstalker]

We have a smart-card system here as well...about 25% of the time, the farebox doesn't read the cards. When that happens, the driver just waves people on without paying.

And the transit authority claims they're losing money...well nobody's ever going to take fare evasion penalties seriously if the drivers wave 50 people on each time the farebox software decides to go belly-up.

[BlaqueKatt]

And the transit authority claims they're losing money...

Ours just can't figure out why ridership is down...hmm $60 a month for a bus pass or $2 a ride-I'm biking-it was actually cheaper to buy a second bike and outfit it for winter than to buy a bus pass-plus the day we got 17 inches of snow-no buses ran-I got to work on my bike though....

[jackfaire]

Ours just can't figure out why ridership is down...hmm $60 a month for a bus pass or $2 a ride-I'm biking-it was actually cheaper to buy a second bike and outfit it for winter than to buy a bus pass-plus the day we got 17 inches of snow-no buses ran-I got to work on my bike though....

84$ a month for an all zone pass and still cheaper than driving. Bike not a viable alternative with how far away I work and ssssh about the fare boxes don't want my area getting any ideas.

[Skelly]

We have a smart-card system here as well...about 25% of the time, the farebox doesn't read the cards. When that happens, the driver just waves people on without paying.

And the transit authority claims they're losing money...well nobody's ever going to take fare evasion penalties seriously if the drivers wave 50 people on each time the farebox software decides to go belly-up.

I'm sure there's no correlation .
Seriously, at some point it has to become cheaper to fix your system properly rather than letting people ride for free?

[Dreamstalker]

Seriously, at some point it has to become cheaper to fix your system properly rather than letting people ride for free?

I've noticed that the fareboxes on the older cars that have been retrofit don't have this issue, only the newer cars (which are crap anyway IMO).

Ours just can't figure out why ridership is down...hmm $60 a month for a bus pass or $2 a ride

We have two types of smartcards, stored-value (keep adding money to it) and monthly. The monthly passes are $XX per month for unlimited rides on all services (subway/bus/commuter rail/water taxi), really only worth it for the heavy commuters.

When I had to go down to the pass office (lost my reduced-fare pass on the train), a few people in line ahead of me were there for problems with the monthly passes. Apparently, the chips were going bad (or that batch of cards was bad from the outset, no way to tell) so the readers couldn't see them. The clerk gives me a monthly pass without even giving me the option. Fast forward 2 weeks, the chip dies. Go back in, get a funny look when I say that no, I don't want the monthly, just give me the normal stored-value. More people in line were there for issues with the monthly cards.

[muses_nightmare]

Wow, $60 a month is relatively cheap! I pay $99 for a two zone pass, it's a good thing I don't need a three zone, those are $136. I think the one zone passes are $73. Plus, I've heard that the fares are going up again! It's probably to do with the Olympics and the new train they've built.

The thing that annoys me the most is there are one or two post-secondary schools that are eligible for a 3 zone pass that costs $25 a month. Of course my school isn't one of them. For a city claiming to be trying to increase ridership and be more "green" they aren't doing a good job by excluding pretty much all post secondary schools besides 2.

[BlaqueKatt]

Wow, $60 a month is relatively cheap!

Madison's not a big city(though apparently we have a wiki page-yay!), plus it's only buses that run from 5am to 11pm mon-fri and from 7am-10pm sat, 8am-8pm sun-some run every 30 min some once an hour-so yeah not so good really. The only buses that run more frequently(as in every 8 minutes) and usually empty are the UW campus routes and college students/state workers don't pay bus fare.

[muses_nightmare]

oh wow, then yeah, for a small town that's expensive.

I still think the fares here are too expensive.. but nothing we can do about that. And apparently they won't give the rest of the post-secondary institutions and such a reduced fare pass because they'd need to increase service...as if no one going to those schools takes transit. With parking and gas it's still cheaper than driving. Though they're doing their best to make that a thing of the past as well, since the fares are going up in January, I believe $81 for a one zone one month pass, not sure about the rest.

I remember the bus service living in a small town, if I had to pay $60 a month for that (which was pretty much the same), I'd be annoyed as well.